


Hard Rock Hallelujah!

by akane171



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Christmas AU, F/M, Karamel Secret Santa 2020, fluff fun and disasters, karamel being tortured by themselves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:34:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28196250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akane171/pseuds/akane171
Summary: In which, a few days before Christmas, Kara is stuck at the airport with a bunch of the weirdest people you could imagine. Arguments, lies, pregnancies, shit, and other things happen during the magical Christmas time and there is no way to escape it. Dammit!
Relationships: Alex Danvers & Kara Danvers, Kara Danvers/Mon-El, Winn Schott Jr./Eve Teschmacher
Comments: 60
Kudos: 54





	1. Day 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cassier556](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cassier556/gifts).



> Firts of all, big thank you for my wifey for editing it <3  
> Secondly, early merry Christmas for Christians and happy holidays for the rest of karamel fam!  
> Thirdly, big thanks for Cassie for organizing Karamel Secret Santa 2020. It was big ass pleasure to write this fic for you. Hope you will enjoy it :)  
> Lastly, I planned an ONE SHOT and it seems I will end with a freaking 3 chaps story TT  
> Anyway, enjoy!

“You can’t tell me when the plane will take off? I have a super important interview in National City and I can’t be late for it,” Kara asked desperately, clinging tightly to the desk.

“I’m sorry, the blizzard…” the check-in girl looked at the big windows that were shaking from the wind and blasts of half-frozen rain and snow. 

She was not going to make it. Snapper was going to skin her alive and make whips from her bowels.

“We are monitoring the weather forecast and will immediately inform you when the situation changes. For now, I can offer to find you a hotel or motel room but-” the service lady shot a nervous glimpse over Kara’s shoulder. 

The CatCo’s reporter didn’t even have to look at the horde of the angry, sweaty wall of customers behind her back to know that finding a hotel room within a 10-kilometers radius of the airport was impossible at this moment.

A sudden, not forecasted massive blizzard decided to ground all planes on the biggest airport on this side of the country, screwing with the Christmas plans of thousands of people.

Kara bit the insides of her cheeks, telling herself that screaming out her frustrations at the poor girl who was just doing her job was not a good idea and that her mother raised her better.

Also, it was time for the Christmas spirit, right? Ho, ho, ho?

“No, thank you,” she smiled weakly and turned to make room for another customer who’s been angrily breathing down her neck while she was talking to the check-in lady.

The moment she took a step to the side he started screaming at the girl and Kara killed the urge to say something about barbaric idiots right to his face, but her eyes caught an interesting view.

A young guy who was talking to the second check-in lady was smiling broadly.

“So, you can’t tell me exactly when the plane takes off. Awe and some, thank you very much,” he said cheerfully and turned to leave. When he noticed Kara, he winked at her.

Kara blinked.

He was wearing a green military jacket, a black t-shirt with some band’s name on it, jeans, combat boots, and had a guitar case hanging from his shoulder. And he was smiling cheerfully. He was basically glowing, like a Christmas tree surrounded by a horde of zombies. 

Like he was happy the flights were delayed. 

That was blasphemy. 

Who the hell did he think he was? Smiling like that? When people’s lives went to limbo, huh?* When HER life was screwed?

Kara felt personally offended. And she felt offended for the thousands of other customers too, of course.

Suddenly, someone pushed Kara and she collided with the guy’s chest.

“Wow, are you all right?”

She raised her head, irritated by the note of concern she could hear in his voice (he had no right to feel concerned about her well-being), and wanted to snap at him, but paused at the sight of his eyes.

They were an interesting color, a mix of blue and grey and her inner journalist wondered how she would describe them on paper.

But the scent of his cologne hit her and she wrinkled her nose. Cinnamon. She was allergic to it.

Just like she was already allergic to this dude, and after 30 seconds of acquaintance at that, which was her personal record (she started hating Siobhan after 5 minutes, yes, she was checking her watch).

“Are-”

“I’m fine,” she finally snapped, unglued herself from his annoyingly hard chest, bumped his shoulder (on purpose), and walked away.

“Hey-”

“Just keep walking and think about Christmas spirit,” she muttered under her breath, navigating herself through the sea of people like a small destroyer.

“Blonde lady, wait-”

Kara gritted her teeth. What the hell did he want? He was probably another typical white straight dude thinking he could ask out every girl who bumped into him, and saving her from falling like she needed saving, she did NOT and-

“Hey, ponytail-”

She stopped and growled so dangerously the people around Kara looked at her and immediately parted in front of her like the Red Sea before Moses.

Ponytail. He called her ponytail. _Ponytail_. 

Her phone rang and when she looked at the screen she almost snorted at the irony, because the boss who loved to call her _Ponytail_ was calling. Like he was invoked by the asshole who was chasing her.

“Hey-”

Kara turned, holding her phone like a grenade, and looked at the guy who was still smiling. 

Her blood boiled.

“I think it’s-”

“Look, you, you-” she stared at his smile, which finally wavered a little, and his green jacket that reminded her suddenly of-

“You Grinch,” she hissed. “I don’t care if you want to pamper your male ego or something, so spare me the trouble and ask out some other damsel in distress, because I’m definitely not one!”

He furrowed his brows a little and turned his head to the side like he was fascinated by her outburst.

What pissed her more. But well, as she already claimed, her mother raised her well.

“Merry Christmas,” she growled, turned on her heel, and finally answered her phone.

“What?” Kara barked what was a horrible way to greet her boss who had “snap” as a part of his last name.

*

An hour later she was sitting at a toilet seat and sighing, wondering if her life could get worse. 

Snapper was not amused that she was not going to make it at the highly anticipated interview with Ben Lockwood, the new and controversial National City’s mayor.

For 15 minutes she had to listen to one of his infamous speeches about new reporters not taking their jobs seriously. 

She needed to blackmail Kelly, her cousin’s wife, to bake her absolutely mouth-watering peanut butter cookies and take them to Snapper with the hope he was not going to make her write horoscopes for another year as a punishment.

Thank God William was going to cover for her and destroy Lockwood with his calm, breathtaking professionalism.

She sighed again, this time dreamily.

Tomorrow at 7 PM, at the Alien Bar, she was going to meet him on their first official date and she could not be happier.

William Dey, the best reporter in CatCo, two times Pulitzer winner, mister handsome and perfect, every girl’s (and some of the men) dream guy, who could charm even Snapper, asked her out and she heard an angels choirs singing when he did it.

A thought that maybe the blizzard was going to screw not only her career but her love life too crossed her mind but she quickly dismissed it.

It was almost Christmas, the time for miracles, and God surely didn’t hate her… that much.

She left the toilet and started looking for a place to sit down. The whole place was crowded, every bench already occupied, even the places near the walls and windows were already full.

The last free spaces were next to the bathroom or near some guy that was sitting on the floor, with his legs stretched and crossed at the ankles. He was hiding behind a newspaper, sitting near a plant growing in a big planter. If he moved his bag a little she could fit there.

Kara put her best smile on her face and approached the man.

“I’m sorry, would you be so kind to move your bag a little? There is no other free place and-”

The newspaper shook in his hands, but before the guy put it down she noticed a few things. 

The pants and boots looked terribly familiar and there was a guitar case resting on the wall.

And then the guy put the newspaper down and a pair of blue-grey eyes were gazing at her calmly.

“Damn,” she said without thinking.

This was not happening. Her karma could not have sucked that much. Did she try to lobotomize whole humanity in her past life or something?

“You’re fucking kidding me,” Kara moaned and gasped right after. She didn’t mean to say it aloud.

He raised a brow.

“No, I’m not,” he answered with sparks dancing in his eyes.

Kara made a sound, something between a choking cat and an English literature teacher scratching the blackboard with her nails to get her class’s attention.

She just stared at him with big eyes and red cheeks. After a few awkward seconds, as no articulated sound escaped her mouth, she just turned on her heel.

The place near the bathroom was perfect. Hell, even hell would be good now. It would be perfect if it could swallow her now and end her misery for good.

“Wait! Lady!... Not again.” She heard his frustrated groan but didn’t stop until something hit her back.

She looked down at her woolen hat that was supposed to be in the pocket of her coat.

Kara lifted it.

“You dropped it, when you bumped into my arm.” The guy stood up and dusted his pants.

“I wanted to give it back but I made a wrong impression, I guess.” He smiled and approached her.

 _Oh. That’s why he was calling after me_ , Kara swallowed hard, feeling utterly, horribly, unbelievably ashamed.

“I’m so sorry,” she said weakly, rumpling the poor hat in her hands.

“No offense taken, it was rather… amusing,” he smiled. “And yes, of course, I can move my stuff for you.”

Kara puffed out her cheeks, thinking hard how to refuse politely because she would rather spend another week in the toilet than near him.

He squinted at her like he could read her mind (what was annoying) and drew out his hand.

“Ok, let’s just forget what has happened and start over. Hi, my name is Mike and my flight is delayed. I’d be delighted if you agreed to share the cold floor with me for the next few hours.”

She stared at his hand for a long moment.

“I don’t think that-”

“Come on, seriously, am I such horrible company that sitting near the toilet sounds better?” he asked sadly and did something with his eyes - they became rounder and gleamed like he was almost tearing up.

And then he winked at her.

Kara snorted and slowly grabbed his hand.

“I’m Kara. And… thank you.” She smiled hesitantly.

“Well, Kara, isn’t this an interesting start to a beautiful friendship?” He grinned back and shook her hand.

*

Kara ignored them for the next hour, focusing on her phone. The memory of her embarrassment was too fresh and the possibility of making an idiot of herself too high.

She chatted with Alex, informed her followers on Twitter about the airport situation, posted a pic of the crowd on Instagram, checked the weather (no improvement), and then her battery ran out.

While searching for her charger in her bag, she glanced at her companion, who other than offering her chewing gum, was silently focused on reading his paper and she was thankful for that.

Kara connected her phone to her charger, looked at his paper, and gasped.

He was reading the worst conservative magazine that constantly tried to portray Miss Grant as some crazy, fanatic feminist who drank men’s blood from their skulls. 

And Mike was obviously a fan. Too bad. Maybe he was chill and handsome, but he probably voted for Trump in the last elections, damn! The perfect man (minus dear William) didn’t exist on this forsaken planet and now she needed to make a plan to avoid conversations with a guy who was enjoying reading a total-

“Bullshit,” Mike sighed and folded the paper.

“What?” Kara asked, throwing her not-getting-involved-with-this-guy plan into the trash bin.

“This article, or to be honest, every piece in this magazine is full of shit and I can’t get how any person with a single working brain-cell believes it. I found it on the bench and took it because I had nothing else to read, and well, it’s always good to see things from the other side, right? This article supports anti-vax-”

Kara didn’t really listen to his explanation, she was preoccupied with cursing herself for being a judging idiot. Again. 

If Snapper had heard it all, he would have balded again.

She shivered.

“Why are you staring at me like that?”

“Huh?”

Kara blinked and realized with panic that indeed, she was looking at his face.

“Nothing, I-” she bit the insides of her cheeks, trying to say something that would not make her sound like a biased, horrible reporter. “I was just thinking that it’s nice you didn’t like it because I work for a competitive magazine.”

Mike took a glimpse at the place between her brows where a half of a crinkle was probably forming. 

“Oh, you’re a reporter?”

“Yes, I work for CatCo.”

He blinked again and then… snorted.

“What’s so funny,” she asked darkly.

“Erm, hmm, I’m sorry? You’re a reporter from CatCo, what a coincidence, huh, that I was reading this particular magazine. You probably thought I was the orange cheetah’s supporter.” He smiled at her weirdly and she got a nasty impression he was hiding something.

And then it hit her what he’s just said.

“You? A Trump supporter? No way!” she laughed but stopped when he scratched his chin, looking at her with squintedsqinted eyes.

“Yeah, you know you get a small wrinkle there when you lie... ”

“I don't have a crinkle!”

“Yes, you’ve got it at the moment,” he said and poked her crinkle.

“Oh, shut up.” Kara slapped his hand away. 

“You’re seriously a reporter with such weak lying skills?”

“They’re not weak,” she muttered angrily, massaging the place between her brows. She seriously needed to botox it. “Not many people know the truth about the crinkle. Even my best friend didn’t realize it.”

“Is that person really your best friend?” he asked skeptically.

Kara stopped massaging her forehead as Lena’s face flashed in her brain.

“I guess?”

“Mhm.” He didn’t sound convinced and she felt an urge to defend her friend.

“She’s nice, pretty and very intelligent, super determined and has a good fashion style… and is very generous and uh… she always does what she wants.”

“I don’t want to be mean, but that sounded like a letter of recommendations, not a description of your best friend.”

“Oh yeah? So please mister, describe your best friend better.”

“If you insist, she’s a short, mean bitch, with the shittiest taste in men and alcohol - she likes żubrówka for fuck’s sake. She cries to National Geographic documentaries. One day she took pics of me throwing up all over myself and posted them on Instagram. She also calls me and the rest of the guys her personal harem and thinks she’s hilarious,” he smiled. “And I absolutely loved her as my friend.”

“That sounded, erm-” Kara couldn’t find a proper word.

“Cool? Amazing? Fantastic? Spectacular?”

“Pathological?”

Mike threw his head back and laughed. “Yeah, that too. But you should see us on one of our concert tours. Not sure how you would call us after that.”

“Oh, so you’re in a rock band?”

“Symphonic power metal band,” he corrected.

“You’re a member of-” Kara glanced at his t-shirt, for sure he was wearing his band’s merch, right? “Iron Maiden? So, you play something similar to Nickleback?”

He turned into a stone for a few long moments.

Absolutely mesmerized, she observed how gazillions of emotions flashed on his face, fighting for supremacy.

Finally, a mix of pain and horror won and she was blessed with a view of his eyes, big and round, white skin, and trembling chin.

She almost wanted to take a picture, because he looked like a kicked puppy.

“How in the world-” he started but needed to take a calming breath. 

“First of all, the guys from Iron Maiden play heavy metal. Secondly, they are one of the most famous metal bands on this planet, how can you not recognize the members? Thirdly, they were formed in 1975, do I look like a sixty-something-year-old dude? No, don’t answer that, please. And lastly...” Mike took another deep breath and closed his eyes. “The so-called band you mentioned...”

Kara didn’t listen to his monologue about how Nickleback could not even be called a rock band, because for the first time in their short acquaintance she managed to ruffle his feathers.

She felt a smile spreading on her face when the devil woke up inside of her.

_Payback time._

“That’s why they absolutely suck,” Mike finished and looked at Kara… who was smiling in a very interesting way, her cheeks flushed and eyes gleaming.

“You didn’t hear a thing I’ve said,” he said flatly.

“Oh no, Nickleback sucks, got it,” she smiled and he shivered a little for some reason. 

“So, you don’t like some music, huh? You’re a-” She searched her memory for the term. William had written a popular article that pissed off a lot of people… He used a word... 

“A music elitist?”

Mike squeezed his eyes harder. 

“No,” he said calmly. “I believe any music is good as long as you enjoy it.”

“Good to know, I really like Florence and the Machine,” she said the name of her fave band and searched his face for a reaction.

He didn’t look disturbed, damn. 

“Imagine Dragons? Paramore?”

Mike kept looking at her flatly. So maybe she needed to lie.

“Panic at the Disco?”

His brow twitched, so yes, that was the good approach. And her crinkle didn’t appear, ha!

“I love Kenny Chesney too.”

He gritted his teeth.

“And wow, Selena Gomez is a queen.”

A vein started throbbing on his forehead.

“And my fave, Kanye West-”

Finally, Mike’s reached his boiling point.

“No, no, no, no, no, no, no. That’s the line. Don’t even mention this motherfucker who called himself the greatest living rock star after killing Bohemian Rhapsody after singing the first note of the song, FIRST NOTE, in front of a British crowd-” he stopped fuming when he noticed how wide her grin was.

“I raised to the bait, didn’t I?” he asked flatly and the only answer he got was Kara throwing her hands up in victory.

“But seriously, Kenny Chesney? Why don't you love yourself, woman?” he asked when she calmed down.

“Hey, She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy is an... interesting song.” She grinned when he put his head into his hands and growled loudly.

“What happened to your music-is good-as-long-you-enjoy-it philosophy?” She slapped his arm.

“Died right after you mentioned West,” He raised his head and looked at her sternly. “But you are not what I expected.”

“I’ll take it as a compliment,” she grinned wider. “And what about my, what did you call it? Weak lying skills?” Kara asked smoothly.

“Touché,” he said and bowed.

“Ha!” She opened her mouth to torture him more, but her phoned beeped.

William wrote that he finished his interview with Lockwood and could not wait for their date.

Kara smiled softly but cursed under her breath after she checked the forecast for the next day.

It seemed the freaking blizzard decided to screw her love life too.


	2. Day 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the blizzard continues screwing Kara’s life, she learns some unexpected news about herself and plots a murder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big-ass thank you for my wifey for editing it <3

Kara didn’t know what woke her up. Was it her aching back, the taste of dead rat in her mouth or a shaking pillow?

Wait, a shaking _pillow_?

Sleepily, Kara opened her eyes and wiped drool from the corners of her mouth, when a light scent of cinnamon and sweat hit her nose.

Then she realized her pillow was not a pillow, but Mike’s shoulder, and he was shaking from silent laughter.

Maybe she should be embarrassed for sleeping on his shoulder and drooling all over him, but weirdly, she didn’t give a damn. Her back hurt too much, the taste in her mouth was too bad, and he was not her potential love interest, so she didn’t care.

Kara unglued herself from his shoulder and hit her head on the wall behind her with a moan.

“What’s so funny?” she asked and closed her eyes again, thinking about her comfy bed.

“I couldn’t sleep last night, was wandering around and Miss Anderson lent me a book,” he chuckled and wiped tears from his eyes.

“And?” she sighed.

Mike cleared his throat. “[ _His manhood stood at full attention, stiff and stony like the vice president,_ ](https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/923536-best-romance-quotes-and-others-that-are-meh)” he read and giggled.

Kara choked on the air she was breathing, which made him laugh even more.

“What the hell are you reading?!” she yanked the book from his hands and looked at the cover.

A couple, a woman with long blonde hair and blue eyes was almost kissing and sitting in the lap of a well-toned guy with short brown hair. Both were naked and covered only with a red blanket, sitting on a couch. They were sweaty too.

For some reason her mouth got dry.

She raised her head and pierced Mike with a demanding look.

“What? I was bored, you were snoring and talking in your sleep about some torture machine called snapper-”

Kara blinked, recalling her dream where she was tied to a chair and Snapper was feeding her like a baby with a mush made of her articles.

“-so I went for a walk and met sweet Miss Anderson who lent me, and I’m quoting here, _the best book ever_ , and how could I say no?” he said and nodded at someone with his head.

Kara expected to see a middle-aged woman, a typical fan of this type of book. 

What she didn’t expect was a sweet seventy-something old granny, dressed like Queen Elizabeth and occupied with knitting.

Yep, Kara couldn’t have told her no either.

She looked at Mike who got up and dusted his pants off. 

“If you’re awake, guard my stuff, I’m going to hunt for some food.”

Kara followed him with her eyes. After he disappeared behind the corner she glanced at the cover again. 

The woman looked like her a little, but the guy for sure didn’t remind her of William, he was more, uhmmm…

She threw the book at the floor with a disgusted face, checked her phone and almost cried because the weather didn’t improve during the night and the forecast was not promising. 

But she grinned when Will asked her how she was doing on WhatsApp and… sent her a link to his interview with Lockwood.

 _How… sweet of him_ , she thought while reading the well written piece and many praising comments below it.

She tried to push away the nasty feeling of jealousy, trying to forget that it should have been _her_ article and remember that she should be _happy_ that William covered for her but... 

It wasn't supposed to be like that, goddammit! How was she going to impress Snapper and Miss Grant if all the good ideas always ended in the more skillful reporters’ hands, and she was stuck in a freaking airport?!

She groaned and put her forehead on her knees, drowning in misery. 

“Do you think we are heading into World War III?” Mike asked five minutes later.

Kara raised her head to see him throw some packages of instant noodles into his bag.

“Huh?” 

He pointed to a group of people with his head.

Kara raised her brows when she noticed two groups of people occupying the opposite row of seats, all from their delayed 787 flight. 

A Mexican family with four children were sitting on the left. The father was not too tall but muscular, having a little too much gel in his hair and was wearing a Mexican national soccer team’s t-shirt. 

On the right, a Russian couple with five children was sitting. The father was completely bald, wearing a tracksuit and a golden chain around his neck.

Both men were glaring at each other from the not so far distance, with their arms folded on their chests. To Kara, they looked like two roosters, guarding their flocks, trying to decide which one had the bigger cock.

Did roosters have cocks? Whatever.

Over their shoulders, the Mexican and Russian mothers exchanged the international look of women tired of their husband’s macho bullshit and shook their heads, showing homemade sandwiches into their children's hands.

Which reminded Kara she was hungry, because since yesterday, she had only eaten a chocolate bar and a slice of pizza.

Her stomach rumbled painfully. 

“You’re hungry? Awesome,” Mike said, offered his hand, and she grabbed it without thinking.

“Awesome?” she asked after standing up.

“I managed to buy the last instant soups, and I’m going to share them with you, but we need hot water.”

“Can’t we ask for some in the coffee shop or something?” She didn’t protest when he put an arm around her shoulders.

“There is a horde of hungry people there, and I’m pretty sure I don’t want to stand in a line for a few hours.” He rolled his eyes. “Besides, I already have a plan, but I need your help.” He started to maneuver them through the crowd.

“Wait, what about our stuff?”

“Miss Anderson agreed to guard it,” he hummed, while they passed a horrendously long queue of angry people standing in line for the toilet. Kara took a picture.

“I still don’t know what you want me to do,” she said, absently examining the pic. She was going to post it on Twitter later.

“Oh, you just need to stand beside me, look miserable and sad and nod your head while pretending to be my wife.”

Kara stopped dead in her tracks.

“What?!” she shrieked.

“Long story short, I talked to Mr Schröder, the janitor, and tried to persuade him to lend me a kettle, but he is old, grumpy and has no sense of humor, but I’m sure he has a soft spot for blonde young miserable women in distress.”

“And you know that because of your amazing psychological skills?”, Kara asked when she got her voice back.

“No, I suspected it just before he caught me after I, erm, kind of broke into the janitor’s closet. He has a photo of his family hanging there, with a young blonde girl on it,” Mike grinned.

“You’re shitting me,” Kara said after a few long seconds staring at him like he was crazy.

“No.”

“How the hell did he not call the security?”

“I charmed my way out somehow?”

“Are you crazy?”

“No? Just hungry.”

They kept staring at each other until Kara’s stomach growled like a lion.

“Look, we do this, or you can try to buy something there-” he pointed to a duty-free shop where nothing edible was left. “Or there-” he pointed to a coffee shop where things were happening like on Bosch's paintings.

A moment later, not believing what they were doing, she was standing in front of an old man who was looking at them like a grumpy hawk, half listening to Mike’s babbling and trying not to die from embarrassment.

“We were heading to our honeymoon in Paris but this blizzard-”

Hugging Mike’s arm, she felt a crinkle was starting to form between her brows. And she was not even the one who was lying, HE WAS!

“Kara’s not feeling too well, and I would not ask you if it hadn’t been necessary to -”

She smiled awkwardly when the old man stared at her skeptically and hugged Mike’s arm tighter. 

And then Mike dropped the bomb.

“Did I mention she’s pregnant?”

*

“That was really good! If I knew you could pretend to swoon like that, I would have asked you to do it before my whole speech.”

Kara raised her head from her knees and threw him a murderous stare, while he plugged in the kettle.

“I didn’t pretend,” she snapped. “I did almost faint, you idiot!”

Mike looked at her and blinked. “So you can faint at will? Cool,” he said and started to dig into his bag.

Kara just groaned and hid her head in her knees again.

When she swooned after he… he … he LIED about her condition, Mike caught her and gathered her into his arms, and she was too pissed off slash embarrassed slash panicked slash ready to faint again to protest.

Mr Schröder could not let unauthorized people enter his closet, but he lent them the kettle and gave her a jar of jam from 1999. He promised to check on them later, muttering something under his breath about Kara reminding him of his granddaughter.

Kara wanted to die, because Mike walked with her in his arms and the kettle in her lap, the whole way from the janitor’s closet to their place. 

People were staring. Some even took pictures. It was horrible. Her life was over. 

She groaned again.

“Come on, cheer up. Your boyfriend won’t know about your fake infidelity,” he joked.

“I don’t have a boyfriend,” Kara snapped and pierced him with another poisonous stare.

“Girlfriend then?” 

“No!” 

“Then what’s the problem?” he raised a brow. 

Kara huffed angrily. What was the problem? The PROBLEM? Let’s see. Screwed career, freaking weather, hurting back, a guy she’s just met making her life a living tragicomedy, love life in a dumpster, oh right!, she missed an opportunity to go on a date with a cute guy too!, and-

Her stomach rumbled like a tank.

“Everything!” she threw her hands in the air.

Mike stared at her for a few seconds and then threw his head back and laughed.

She wanted to yell at him again, but somehow his laugh calmed her down.

Maybe because he looked adorable while laughing.

“It’s not funny,” she muttered when he calmed down.

“I’m sorry, I just… Let me solve at least one of your problems,” he stood up and turned on his heel.

“What are you doing?” she asked confused.

“Going to borrow some things.”

She watched him as he approached the Mexican family and started talking to the guy, who listened to Mike with furrowed brows. 

The man called one of his sons, who came and started translating. 

With a corner of her eye, she saw the Russian mom with her son approaching the group. The Russian man opened his mouth, but she just shushed him away.

Then a Mexican little girl tugged her brother’s shirt and started arguing with him, probably, because he was translating Mike’s words incorrectly. Mexican mom approached the group and just raised her finger when her husband opened his mouth. He exchanged an international stare of confused husbands with the Russian guy, but they remembered they still didn’t know which of them had a bigger dick. 

So, they glared at each other again. 

Suddenly, all of them started to talk at the same moment until Mike raised his hands and pointed at Kara. 

Whole group looked at her.

Her face turned bright red in a second. She hastily grabbed the book that was lying beside her, opened it and started reading, so she would not look like a total idiot.

The blood almost burst out of her cheeks while she skimmed over one of the most descriptive sex scenes she’s read in her entire life.

But she could only keep her eyes on the text, even if it was making her regret her life choices, or look at the group that was discussing things again while staring at HER.

Kara kept reading about a sweaty couple doing some super bed yoga things and after 10 pages she realized a little embarrassed, she was not skimming anymore, but actually reading word by word. 

“Damn, I could not bend like that,” she muttered under her breath, with hot cheeks and gleaming eyes.

“Like what?” Mike suddenly sat beside her, holding two mugs, a package of cookies and an apple.

Kara made a choking noise, when he drew closer and read, READ!, the part where the blonde blue-eyed girl and brown haired hot guy were basically making pretzels of themselves.

“Hmm,” he hummed and drew back and Kara realized she was holding her breath, while her stomach was doing funny things.

_Hmm? Hmm?! HMMMM?! What was that supposed to mean?!_

She glared at him, while he put the noodles into the mugs. When the water boiled, he poured into the mugs and handed her one.

“What?” he asked, when she didn’t take it instantly.

“Nothing,” she murmured and finally took it carefully, the chemical scent reaching her nose.

Never in her life had she smelled something so delicious.

“That’s for you too,” he threw an apple and the cookies into her lap. “From Mrs. Gonzales and Mrs. Sidorov.”

Kara got a weird feeling staring at the snacks.

“And why did they give it to me?” she asked suspiciously.

He didn’t respond, just shrugged and took a sip, while not looking at her.

Kara’s unspecified suspicions became a certainty when the two women approached her a few minutes later with bright smiles and started to talk in their native languages. She didn’t understand a thing. But they brought her a blanket. 

And then patted her stomach and returned to their spots, ignoring their husbands, who didn’t look thrilled.

“I’m going to murder you,” she hissed through the gritted teeth.

“Why?” he asked happily and took a bite of HER apple. 

“You told them I’m pregnant too! And now these sweet women gave me their supplies! You-You-! Lied!”

“I think we simply misunderstood each other or something was lost in translation,” he shrugged nonchalantly but didn’t look into her eyes. “Try to chill, because we really look like an old married bickering couple. Here, eat an apple,” he put the fruit he bit on her hand and stood up.

“And don’t worry, I’m going to pay for the snacks” Mike winked at her and grabbed his guitar. 

He sat in the middle of the lounge and played a few chords. 

In a second he was surrounded by the kids, who sat in the circle and demanded their favorite Disney songs. 

Did he arrange it while borrowing the mugs? Probably.

Mike started to play and sing Hakuna Matata.

He was quite good, even if it was obvious he was goofing around, trying to sound like Timon and Pumba. The kids loved it and asked for a repeat.

When he played I'll Make a Man Out of You, she took her phone out and recorded the whole thing, and she told herself to ask him what band he played in later. At some point he started playing the melodies and the kids were singing the songs in their native languages.

Kara posted the video on her social media and then grabbed the mugs and went to the toilet to wash them.

When she came back, he was in the middle of performing the most popular and annoying Disney song.

“Let it gooooooooooooooooo, let it gooooooooooooooo!”

Kara smiled-

“I don’t give shit anymoreeeeeeeeeeeeeee!”

And choked on the air.

“MIKE!” she ran to him and put her hands on his throat like she wanted to choke him.

“What?” he looked at her, still playing on his guitar. “Want to join us?”

“NO!” 

“Oh, you want to tell them a fairy tale then?” he asked with mirth dancing in his eyes.

Kara opened her mouth to yell about how he could not sing inappropriate interpretations of Disney songs to kids, but blinked when the flock of nine children stared at her with excitement, like little dinosaurs staring at their next meal.

“Wait, I’m not-”

Mike grabbed her hand and pushed down to sit beside him.

“Kara is amazing storyteller-”

“I’m not! I’m a reporter!”

“A professional one, even better, I can’t wait to hear it too.” He threw her a charming, sweet smile and all she wanted was to put her hands on his throat and strangle him to death.

She looked around, noticing the flushed cheeks and shining big eyes and realized she was fucked, because telling them a story about corruption in the City Hall was not an option, damn.

“Uhm, so there was a… princess,” she started.

The youngest Russian girl, who was about 5, clicked her tongue.

“Boring,” she said flatly.

Kara’s mouth fell wide open. 

_Boring? BORING?! Just wait you little brat!_

“And there was a dragon!”

“So, it’s Game of Thrones?” the oldest Mexican boy asked.

_Shit!_

“Well, no, because… She WAS the dragon and… and… she lived on Krypton and that was a planet!”

 _Oohs_ and _ahhs_ followed, and she mentally patted herself, ignoring Mike who was smirking beside her and accompanied her story with his guitar.

A lot of explosions, flying dragons, time travels, wars, marriages and fake, horrible scorpion friends happened for the next hour. 

“The end!” she finally finished and threw her hands into the air.

The kids (and, to be honest, most of the people in the lounge) kept staring at her without a sound.

“But what happened later?” one of the Gonzales boys asked.

“Uhm,” Kara blinked, confused.

“That’s a story for another time,” Mike said, grabbed her hand and helped her to stand up, ignoring the protesting kids.

“No way I can continue this story,” she moaned and banged her head against the wall, when they reached their spot.

“I’m sure you’re going to figure something out,” he sat and dug out a bottle of mineral water from his bag.

Kara unglued her forehead from the wall and stared at him accusingly.

“It’s your fault, you know,” she growled.

“As guilty as charged,” he smiled and handed her the bottle.

And she just could not stay angry at him when he was grinning like that. Besides, her throat was dry and sore, so she grabbed the bottle and sat down beside this impossible man.

She fished out her phone from her coat and groaned at the amount of messages from Alex, her mom, friends and notifications from Twitter and Instagram. On Facebook everyone was sharing William’s interview. And yep, the weather didn’t improve.

Kara sighed.

“What’s wrong?” Mike asked and poked her with his elbow.

“Nothing, just-” she looked into his greyish-blue eyes and suddenly she wished she could just tell him everything.

Maybe she could?

“Well, in a few hours I was supposed to enter one of the fanciest restaurants in National City and spent time with a very handsome and nice guy on our first date planned for weeks,” she didn’t notice he flinched a little. “Which is not going to happen, thanks to the-” she waved at the blizzard behind the windows.

Then she described her wasted opportunity to shine in the interview with Lockwood, her work frustrations and horrible mean boss.

“I just hope he’s not going to fire me or order me to write horoscopes for the next year,” she sighed miserably.

Mike didn’t say a word for some time and Kara hoped she didn’t bore him too much.

“Why don’t you just write about it?” he asked suddenly.

“About what?” She furrowed her brows. “The whole situation at the airport? I’m updating my followers on social media.”

“No, I don’t mean the mere facts, but the stories,” he stood up and grabbed the kettle. “Who wants to read another boring and important article about the new assholish mayor of National City? It’s Christmastime and you have here hundreds of people, packed in one place for days. Everyone here can tell you something.” He flashed her a smile and walked away.

Kara bit the insides of her cheeks and looked around the crowded place, like she was seeing her surroundings for the first time, some ideas raising in her head.

He was right. It was so obviously simple. 

*

When Mike came back with the kettle filled with water, he smiled when he saw his companion focused on her phone, furiously writing something.

He turned the kettle on and went to beg the Russians for some tea bags.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The horrible line Mon-El read is not mine invention, I inserted a link from where I took it. People claim it's an actual quote from a real book but I have my doubts...  
> Nice readers can get another update in this week... JFYI.  
> Thanks for reading!


	3. Day 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Christmas finally came and some miracles happened, but no, fake pregnancies don’t become real, because after all, it’s not the Bible, just a story about a reporter with horrible luck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big kudos for my amazing wifey for beta-reading it,  
> Enjoy!... and prepare pitchforks xD

“Wake up, sunshine, it’s ho, ho, ho Christmas!”

Kara groaned when the super annoying voice pierced her ears. She put the blanket over her head.

“Go away,” she moaned when he poked her nose through her cover.

She was tired. She spent the last evening wandering around and talking to people. Some sent her to hell, some didn’t want to talk, some talked too much about being pissed off about the situation and just ranted. 

But she managed to gather some heartwarming, sweet, teary, funny and interesting stories. She had been writing and editing them for most of the night, added some pics and vids and posted them on her blog and other social media.

And now this annoying man was disturbing her well-deserved rest.

“Go away,” she repeated.

He chuckled. “I would, but a grumpy blonde is laying in my lap.”

Kara took the blanket off of her head and opened her eyes.

Indeed. She was laying on her back, with her head in his lap, cocooned in the blanket like a caterpillar. 

“Hi,” Kara said, staring into his eyes.

They were stormy-blue, she decided. Not exactly blue, not exactly gray, a perfect mix that made them look like the sea just before the storm.

“Hi,” he smiled softly and brushed the lock of her hair from her forehead. 

“How did I end up in this compromising position?” she asked, voice a little raspy, killing the urge to touch the place where his fingers brushed her skin.

“After you posted your stories you wrapped yourself in the blanket, put your head on my shoulder and said you were going to castrate me if I woke you up. You fell asleep and at some point just slid to my lap.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she lied, because hell, her back was not hurting like yesterday, she was warm, cozy and had a really nice view of his handsome face.

The corner of his mouth twitched when he glimpsed at her traitorous crinkle. 

She groaned and put the blanket over her head again.

“Kara, I need to go to the restroom.”

“Five more minutes,” she murmured.

“I’m going to pee myself,” he said flatly.

“Life is brutal,” she yawned sleepily and snuggled her face into his stomach.

She heard his tired sigh and grinned, more payback, _ha_!

“Are you ticklish?” he asked suddenly.

Kara froze.

“No.”

“Hmm, why can I hear your crinkle forming?”

“You’re hallucinating, and I’m not tickli-EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEK!!!”

She shrieked loudly when he dug his fingers into her sides.

Kara sat up abruptly and glared at Mike.

“I’m going to murder you,” she deadpanned.

He smiled but looked at the place between her brows.

There was no crinkle.

In a second he was on his feet, running into the restroom’s direction.

Kara made a move like she wanted to get up and run after him, because yes, he was not going to be safe even in the men restroom, but she heard a laugh.

Whole lounge was staring at her, some people were smiling, some chuckling, some, especially the Russian and Mexican moms, were looking at her with horribly soft faces.

The smiles disappeared when they looked disappointedly at their husbands and shook their heads.

There were fewer people at the airport, because some passengers chose another transport or simply came back to their homes. 

Still, there were a lot of them and all were looking at her like she was a damned celebrity.

Kara slowly put the blanket again on her head, shielding herself from the stares.

She checked the weather on her phone and cursed under her breath. No chance of spending Christmas with her family and friends. 

Miserably, she entered her social media accounts, not expecting any feedback, but was surprised by the amount of likes, comments and shares. 

It seemed people loved the story of an English teacher creating an airport kindergarten where she and the children made Christmas decorations from paper cups and plates, candy wrappers and napkins. Or the photo essay from yesterday’s throwing-paper-planes-contest some bored passengers organized (the longest throw was made by an old Rwandan man who flew to America to spend Christmas with his daughter for the first time in years). 

But the most favorite stories were the pieces about tiny acts of kindness. 

Like when Miss Anderson gave a scarf she knitted to the janitor, Mr Schröder. Or how people were sharing tea bags, mugs, coffee and snacks. The pics with children from every country you could imagine were playing together, even when they didn’t speak the same language. The film where the scary looking Russian father was walking with a baby of a single mom who could finally nap, humming and making funny faces, making the baby giggle. The Mexican dad making paper planes for all the kids. Mr Schröder allowing children to ride on his floor scrubber.

What made her smile like crazy, were comments from the families and friends of people who were stuck with her at the airport. Saying how happy they were to read and see their beloved ones were safe and maybe not too thrilled, but in good mood and spirits.

She gasped when in a comment section she noticed a pic of her and Mike from when she was telling the story to the kids. 

Kara felt warmth spreading inside her body. At least she managed to do something good for Christmas. 

She was in such an amazing mood, that when Mike hesitantly came back some time later, she didn’t murder him.

Kara just dug her fingers into his side when he didn’t expect it.

He squealed like a little girl.

_Ha!_

*

“Absolutely not how I imagined spending Christmas some days ago,” Kara said and took a pic of the kids and a few adults decorating a palm tree. 

“Could be a lot worse,” Mike hummed.

Something in his voice made her look at him. He was staring at the people decorating the tree, but she was pretty sure he was wandering with his thoughts somewhere far away, and it was not a nice place.

Before she could say something, she heard someone calling her name. 

Well, almost her name.

“Kira Danvers?”

She rolled her eyes and waved her hand and the airport guard.

“There are a lot of people waiting at the entrance for you.”

She blinked.

“Huh?”

*

“I don’t understand,” she stuttered, gaping at the group of people who were holding a lot of boxes and packages full of food.

“You’re Kara Danvers, the reporter who wrote about the people stuck here, right?” one of them, holding five boxes of pizza asked.

“Yes,” she answered with a panicked voice. “But I didn’t order anything!”

“We know. We are the owners of local restaurants and after reading your articles, we decided to bring food,” he said and the rest of the people nodded.

Kara opened her mouth but didn’t say anything for a few long moments.

“But why?” she finally asked.

The man shrugged. “It’s Christmas,” he smiled.

*

“I can’t believe it,” Kara said while munching on potstickers and making orgiastic sounds.

They were _so_ delicious. 

“It’s a freaking miracle!”

“Not really, just a hard-working, very talented reporter,” Mike nudged her with an elbow.

They were sitting in a circle made by the passengers of the flight 878 and few airport workers, surrounded by food, drinks and happy chatter. All the people mixed together, like all the invisible barriers that were still there just a day before, magically disappeared. 

The most surprising view was the Mexican and Russian men, who pulled out bottles of tequila and vodka from their bags earlier and shared them with others, were now sitting with arms thrown at each other and singing songs together, like old best friends.

Mr Schröder brought an ancient cassette player and Miss Anderson was teaching him how to waltz. From her shining eyes and his less grumpy attitude, Kara concluded that they were enjoying themselves a lot.

Kara looked around, noticing the happy faces, listening to the easy chatters and eruption of laughter. 

She sighed, satisfied.

“Not the worst way to spend Christmas, don’t you think?” she asked Mike.

“Are you kidding me? The best Christmas in my life,” he smiled back with such a happy face she just had to smile back, but then it hit her what he said.

“You’re not a fan of Christmas, are you,” she said, remembering suddenly how he reacted to the news that the flight was delayed.

And not even once he was upset that he had to spend the Christmas at the airport.

He blinked and his easy smile froze on his lips.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked, I-”

“Nah, it’s ok,” he sighed. “I just-” he scratched his jaw and for the first time he looked uncertain.

“My parents divorced when I was a kid and well, it was not a perfect marriage before that, so Christmas was not the happiest time, more like a parade of pretended smiles and empty gestures,” he shrugged. “Later they both remarried, my half brothers and sisters were born and they are all happy and want to share it with me but, I just, you know, it’s not working... And I don’t mind, but they still demand I visit them at Christmas and uuugh, I love them all but, it’s like I’m the third wheel and...” he made a wave with his hands like he could not describe what he was feeling.

“You feel like you don’t fit with them, and you want to be left alone,” she said.

He threw her a look and nodded his head. “How did you know?”

“My parents died in a car crash when I was a teen and my aunt took care of me,” she said slowly. “I love her and Alex, and yearn to spend Christmas with them, but sometimes I get that feeling of being surrounded by people who love you, but still being...”

“Alone,” he finished and they both fell silent.

Finally, Mike cleared his throat. 

“That was a mood killer, but after all, you called me Grinch if I remember correctly.”

Kara punched his arm. “Don’t remind me. I acted horribly, didn’t I.”

“Maybe a little,” he chuckled and looked at her with furrowed brows.

“What?”

“You are not going to...” he said dramatically and drew his face nearer.

“What?” she asked, her heart skipped a beat when their faces were inches apart.

“Write an article about me to get more food,” he said teasingly, so she punched his arm again.

He chuckled, but didn’t draw his head back. 

When his laugh died, her heart fluttered, when something changed in the air around them. The sounds around them muffled and suddenly they were alone, her, him and his stormy eyes watching her so intensely, like she was the only person in the entire world.

Drowning in his darkening eyes Kara realized she would not mind staring at them every day.

Mike glanced at her lips, she forgot how to breath and-

Her phone rang.

And the amazing spell was broken.

“Shit, that’s my aunt,” Kara groaned after looking at the screen. 

“Better not make her wait,” he winked at her and turned his head when someone called him.

“Hey, Eliza,” she answered the phone and tried to sound cheerful, not disappointed as seven hells.

She loved her aunt like a second mother. She really did, but not exactly at that moment. Especially, because Alex wanted to talk to her too, and then Kelly, John, Winn, Eve, James, Sam and Ruby, and they all needed to describe how much they missed her and how the party sucked without her in detail (she didn’t believe them, because most of them sounded happily drunk) and she wanted to murder them all when Mike grabbed his guitar, moved his ass away to not disturb her and started to play Last Christmas.

When she finally finished the conversation he was replaying the song for the sixth time, and it didn’t look like his concert was going to end soon.

She sighed, cursing her family and hoping her and Mike could return to… that moment when something _nice_ was happening between them.

Her phone rang again and this time William’s name appeared on the screen.

Kara groaned and suddenly felt guilty. Maybe because she didn’t spare a thought about him for two days? With a heavy heart she answered.

He was sweet, compassionate, asked how she was doing and promised to take her for the date right after she came back.

Probably, she should have simply said no, but half listening to him and watching singing Mike, she realized how irresponsible she was acting. 

In a few hours, after the end of the blizzard and finally reaching National City, they were not going to see each other again. They were just two strangers, caught in an unusual situation, trying to survive boring days together without murdering each other. After that, their paths were going to split and… and that was it.

So, she agreed to William’s proposition, wished him Merry Christmas and ended the conversation. 

Without being satisfied.

Mike was playing another song, something she didn’t know, maybe his original piece, about a sleeping sun and solar seas. It was slow and peaceful...

Kara closed his eyes and drifted away to sleep, lulled by his deep, smooth voice.

*

“Kara, hey, Kara wake up.”

She groaned and tried to shush the hand that was shaking her shoulder.

“Wake up, or you’re going to miss the plane.”

“What plane, you asshole, it was delayed and-”

 _Wait_. Why was she hearing such a buzz?

Kara opened her eyes to see people gathering their belongings and running around like headless chickens. 

It was morning already and when she glanced at the windows, she saw sun rays and clear, blue sky.

She gaped and looked at Mike who smiled broadly.

“We're taking off in an hour.”

*

They didn’t sit near each other on the plane, and she lost the sight of him after getting off. 

While frantically looking around and finally spotting him, while he was maneuvering through the crowd in her direction, she realized how much she didn’t want it to end. 

She didn’t want them to be just strangers at the airport but… something more. 

“Hey, can you wait for me for a sec? I spotted Miss Anderson and I forgot to give her book back,” he smiled when she nodded and sprinted to the old lady.

“Kara, finally!” Suddenly she was assaulted by her cousin who hugged her from behind so strongly it knocked the air out of her lungs.

Eliza, John, Kelly, and Winn appeared too, and she felt tears gathering in her eyes.

“We decided to surprise you,” Eliza said and hugged her too. “Eve is in your loft, warming leftovers up, hope you are hungry.”

Kara’s stomach rumbled at the mention of Eliza’s homemade food and everyone laughed, but she was too occupied looking over their shoulders for the sight of Mike to care.

“But in her place, someone else decided to come,” Alex said in a teasing voice and pushed her into William’s direction.

William who was smiling softly and holding a beautiful bouquet of roses.

“For you.”

“Thank you,” she said and awkwardly took the flowers.

Of course, at that moment she caught the glimpse of Mike, who was standing in the crowd.

Their eyes met, and she wanted to call out to him, but Winn put an arm around her shoulders and pushed in the exit direction.

She wanted to protest, but Mike just smiled easily, saluted and disappeared into the crowd.

And from her life.

*

He really wanted to say a quick goodbye to Miss Anderson, come back to Kara and ask for a number, but her family came, and he didn’t want to interrupt. Maybe he could wait and approach them in a proper moment?

But when William Dey walked up to her with the flowers, he felt like he was punched in the chest and could only smile awkwardly, saluted her, turned on a heel and ran away with tail between his legs. 

His escape was not successful though, because after a few steps he ran into Miss Anderson who stood firmly on his way, with a scowl on her face and hands on her hips, looking super annoyed.

“Michael, don’t be a fucking pussy,” she said with a distinctive British accent and while he was gathering his jaw from the floor, she answered her ringing phone.

“Yes, darling?” she said and Mike could have sworn he heard Mr Schröder’s voice.

She patted his shoulder and disappeared in the crowd, still talking to her, it seemed, new boyfriend.

And Mike just… stood her for a few more moments, trying to digest all what just had happened.

He had no idea how long he was standing there like an idiot.

“Waiting for an invitation or something?” he heard an irritated female voice. 

He blinked and saw his two bandmates standing in front of him.

Freya, the short red-head lead vocalist, was glaring at him with her hands on her hips, mimicking almost perfectly Miss Anderson.

“What the hell man, we called you three times, and you were just standing here like a zombie,” Fitz furrowed his brows.

Mike blinked at his friends again.

“Am I a pussy?” he asked blankly.

Freya and Fitz exchanged a look and then stared at him again.

“We are definitely too sober to discuss this,” Freya said flatly and Fitz grabbed his shoulder.

Together they dragged him out and basically threw him into a car.

While Freya was driving and breaking all the traffic regulations, Fitz was throwing him worried looks.

“Are you ok, Mon-El?” he asked after his sister almost ran over a pigeon.

“Yeah, I guess I’m just really a pussy,” he deadpanned, staring lifelessly at his hands.

“Cool, cool, cool, just keep in mind we’re playing a concert in five days, and it would be nice if you remembered how to be our lead guitarist for two hours- WATCH WHERE YOU ARE GOING, ASSHOLE!” Freya yelled at some poor pedestrian, who almost died under their wheels.

Mon-El didn’t respond, because an idea was slowly blossoming in his brain.

Their concert. Five days. Here, in National City.

Maybe… maybe he was not going to stay a pussy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nice readers get updates super soon, just saying.  
> Thanks for reading, hope you liked :)


	4. Every day after

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which, things can become real even if it’s only on social media and some men, fortunately, are not pussies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always kisses for my amazing wifey for edited it. Have a nice new university year, meine liebe ;*

The date was… nice. 

Ok, not nice, it was flawless. Like dumplings without filling. 

William was a sweet, very handsome gentleman, his British accent was perfect, and he was everything a woman could dream about.

And yet, it seemed it was not Kara’s cup of English tea.

Maybe her expectations were too high, but during the date in the most popular and expensive restaurant in Nation City she felt absolutely nothing. No butterflies, no fluttering heart, no sudden reddening cheeks, no nothing. 

William was just too… nice. 

It hit her in the middle of their date, when he praised her journalism, claiming that she,  _ uuuugh _ , wrote with her heart, and she wanted to answer that nope, she wrote with her fancy green pen or used a keyboard, but she was pretty sure he would not appreciate the sarcasm. 

Mike would have loved it.

She sighed. Maybe her dream date ended like it did (aka her lying about head killing her and escaping to her loft, where she ordered pizza and pot stickers), because she compared William to Mike too much during it.

While sitting on her couch in her pajama and munching on pizza she was not even sure what was so great about Mike that she couldn’t stop thinking about him.

This was how Alex found her an hour later.

“Ok, what went wrong?” she asked and put three ice-cream boxes on the coffee table. 

“Did he burp while eating? Insult Florence and the Machine? Boasted about himself? Revealed he tortured ants when he was a kid?”

“No,” Kara answered, staring blankly at the wall. “He was a sweetheart.”

Alex stared at her for a moment without blinking and then went to the fridge and took out a bottle of beer.

“Spill,” she sat in front of Kara, opened the bottle and mentally prepared herself.

“There’s nothing to talk about,” Kara shrugged. “He’s just the perfect man… for someone else, maybe Imra? I think they would make a cute couple.”

Alex blinked again and took a slow sip. Hadn’t Kara been pining for the dude for the past two years?

“Did he annoy you or something?”

“No, and I guess that was the problem,” Kara sighed, still staring at the wall.

Alex raised her brows. “The date was bad, because William didn’t annoy you?”

“Mhm, he didn’t say anything that kept me on my toes. His smile’s cute and charming, not an annoying smirk means trouble and teasing. His eyes are pretty, but they don’t dance with mirth when he schemes something… I’m not even sure if William is capable of scheming anything?” she mumbled, her eyes still glued to the wall.

“I mean, the date was well planned, everything went according to it, there were no surprises… with Mike something would have exploded for sure...”

Alex, who was ready to take a sip, froze. “Who’s Mike?”

Kara blinked and finally looked at her cousin, her face brightening up.

“This guy I met at the airport, he was so freaking annoying and I got embarrassed because of him more times I could count… It was amazing and-” she started to describe his annoying ass.

Alex got up, went to the closet and took out a glass and a bottle of whiskey.

She sat down, poured half of the glass, stopped, looked at Kara who was still describing the most annoying dude in the universe with pink cheeks and shining eyes, and filled the glass to the edge.

Fifteen minutes later she poured a glass for her cousin too.

For the next hour she listened to Kara's blabbering and was getting more and more suspicious about the annoying guy. 

One bottle of whiskey later, everything became quite clear.

“You fell for him,” Alex said slowly.

Kara stopped describing the color of his eyes for the third time and stared at her cousin drunkenly.

“No?” she crinkled. “Maybe?” the crinkle wavered. “Yes?” it disappeared.

Kara groaned and put her head into her hands. “It’s complicated.”   


“Maybe I’m not too drunk enough, but how is liking a guy complicated?” the older girl asked. 

Kara started plucking at her sweater, not looking at Alex. 

“What?”

“Uhm, I don’t know his whole name.”

Alex blinked, killing the urge to ask her reporter cousin how the hell she didn’t ask for a name of a dude she was literally drooling all over for a few nights. 

“And uhm… he knows where I work and my name, and he didn’t contact me so… maybe, maybe he doesn’t want...” she shrugged helplessly.

“Oh, don’t be such a drama queen. We don’t live in dark ages and women can stalk their crushes and make the first move too.” She smacked Kara’s arm. “Ok, so no checking him on social media, but didn’t you say he plays in a band?”

Kara raised her eyes and a small smile appeared on her lips.

“Yes! We can try to google metal bands!”

Alex blinked again. “Wait, you don’t know the name of the band either? How… ugh-” she stopped when the smile melted from Kara’s face. “I mean, it can’t be that hard to find a metal band, there can’t be that many of them,” she coughed hoping she was right.

Kara fetched her laptop and Alex sat beside her on the couch, putting a blanket over their legs.

When Kara opened google, they both started at it for a minute.

“Now what?” the glorious reporter asked.

“I don’t know… wait, doesn’t Winn like this type of music?”

“He does!”

Alex pulled out her phone, struggled for a moment with unblocking it and finally dialed the number.

He didn’t pick up.

“Ugh, what now?” she asked Kara who was sulking again.

“We can call Eve?” 

“Great idea!”

Alex dialed another number and this time she succeeded.

“ _ What the fuck, Alex!? It’s 2 AM! _ ”

The older Danvers blinked. “It is? Uhm, sorry? Can you wake up Winn?”

“ _ I swear to God, if no one died I’m going to kill you! _ ” 

Alex, the fearless FBI agent shivered in fear at Eve Teschmacher’s murderous voice.

“Erm, no, it’s about Kara’s love life, she has a new crush.”

There was a long pause and then both Danvers girls heard a loud smack and then a yelp of pain.

“ _ What-what-what-?!!! _ ”

“ _ Stop what-ing, you idiot, and talk to Alex! _ ”

“ _ It’s the middle of the night, Pumpkin, what- _ ”

“ _ Don’t call me that and talk to her or there will be no sex for a month!” _

_ “But-” _

_ “TALK! TO! ALEX!” _

_ “Ok, ok! Stop hitting me… Uhm, Alex?” _

“Hey, Winn, sorry for disturbing you...”

_ “Yes?” _

“Erm, I had a question… mhm… what was it...”

_ “Alex… are you drunk?” _

“No, we drank only one bottle and-”

“We are not drunk!” Kara huffed offended.

They both heard Eve squealing.  _ “KARA WHO IS HE I NEED TO KNOW!” _

_ “God, Eve, not into my ear! Alex, why are you calling?” _

Alex blinked and looked at Kara.

“Why are we calling him?”

Kara blinked back.

“You are calling him, not me?”

“Kara! Focus!”

_ “DO I KNOW HIM?!” _

“His band! We need to find his band!”

_ “IS HE CUTE?!” _

“Right. Winn, where can we search for metal bands?”

There was another pause at the end of the line that was interrupted again by Eve’s squeal.

_ “OH MY GOD IS HE A MUSICIAN?!” _

Alex rolled her eyes. “Yes, he’s a guitarist.”

Eve squealed again.

“ _ Uhm, you could try a site, metal-archives or just- _ ”

“Thanks Winn, we will manage.”

“ _ But I know a lot and- _ ”

_ “GUITARISTS ARE AMAZING WITH THEIR FINGERS!” _

Kara choked on her whiskey and Alex just rolled her eyes.

“Thanks, bye.”

_ “NO, YOU CAN’T-” _

Alex ended the call and sighed.

Immediately, Eve called back. Without a second of hesitation Alex turned her phone off.

“She’s going to kill you,” Kara laughed but stopped when her phone started to ring too.

She turned her phone off too.

“Not a word,” she growled to Alex who smiled smugly.

They opened the site Winn suggested.

“Oh, how cool, we can search the bands by the country,” Kara smiled. “There can’t be that many American bands, and… 30,845 results?”

They both stared at it without making sounds, suddenly feeling perfectly sober.

Alex got up and brought a bottle of martini.

“Do you remember what genre they play?”

Kara furrowed her brows, trying to recall what he said.

“Something about uhm… electricity?”

Alex scratched her head and looked at the choices.

“Well, not pagan or viking metal for sure… Electronic?”

Kara shook her head.

“Power?”

“YES!” Kara threw her hands in the air.

“Uhm...”

“What?”

“8,312 bands...”

Kara blinked with her hands still up in the air.

“Just pour me another glass.”

*

She was woken up by an explosion of supernova or something equally bright, because it couldn’t be just simple sun rays falling on her face, right?

And yet, they were just freaking sun rays.

Kara slowly sat up and put her head into her hands with a groan.

They didn’t find the band, there were too many of them. Plus, after drinking martinis they were too drunk and just fell asleep together on the couch.

Somewhere in the morning, she registered Alex's not so soft curses, when she got her ass up, almost crawled to the bathroom and then left Kara’s loft.

Kara simply turned to her other side, blessed Saturday free-from-work mornings, and fell asleep again.

And well, now, when Snapper asked her to edit some of her airport articles and post them on CatCo’s pages. The readers absolutely loved them, and she was not worried about Snapper sending her to write horoscopes anymore.

Especially because her Christmas pieces were much more popular than William’s interview.

Kara would be lying if she had said she was not satisfied as hell.

Anyway, she could sleep as long and soundly as she wanted. 

Which didn’t change the fact that her love life was still in limbo.

Kara sighed and turned on her phone. She grimaced and ignored gazillion messages from Eve, who was demanding answers, Mike’s pics, body details and claiming she knew something weird was going on between Kara and William since the moment they all came to the reporter’s loft from the airport.

She half expected her best friend was going to storm into her loft any minute, so probably it was a good moment to find some painkillers and maybe take a long, long walk away from her home.

The phone buzzed suddenly and kept doing it like crazy, receiving hundreds notifications from her social media.

She furrowed her brows. Probably, some celebrity shared one of her pieces.

Her phone rang, this time Winn’s name flashed on her screen.

Praying it was not Eve using her fiancé’s phone, Kara answered.

“Hi, Winn, I’m really, really sorry for-”

“ _ WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME YOU KNOW MON-EL?!!! _ ”

Kara groaned when his voice drilled into her poor brain.

“Winn, wh-”

_ “HOW COULD YOU?! YOU KNOW STARGAZERS IS MY FAVORITE BAND!!! _ ”

“Winn-”

_ “AND YOU SPENT WHOLE THREE DAYS WITH HIM ?!!! AND YOU DIDN’T GET ME AN AUTOGRAPH?!!!” _

“What are you-”

_ “WE ARE NOT FRIENDS ANYMORE KARA DANVERS!!!” _

”Winn, stop behaving like Eve and explain what you are talking about!”

She heard his angry huffs.

_ “Just check your Twitter. I’m disappointed, Kara,” _ he sniffed and ended the call.

Mon-El? Stargazers?  _ No way! _

Kara blinked and hastily opened Twitter, trying to not get too excited.

She gasped at the amount of new comments and shares of her video of Mike singing to the kids - sometime in the middle of the night a fan of his band found her tweet and things went viral. The band’s fans, calling themselves Stargazers Squad, invaded her vid and flooded it with comments.

Scrolling down and skimming on the comments she caught a few interesting things.

He was the founder and lead guitarist of Stargazers. His name was Michael Gand but he was known as Mon-El. 

Suddenly, her smile froze and a cold shiver ran down her spine, when she spotted a comment from a user BritishLady1955 about… about…

Her phone rang.

Without noticing who was calling she answered.

“Yes,” she said faintly and didn’t even cringe when Eve’s squeal drilled in her brain.

“ _ YOU ARE PREGNANT WITH THE HOT GUITARIST’S BABY?!!! _ ”

*

In the end she took some days off and barricaded herself in the loft and refused to talk to anyone (minus Eliza), even when Eve almost broke her doors down and camped out on the corridor for half of the day, until Winn (who was still offended) finally came to drag her (kicking and screaming) home.

She didn’t know what she expected after the comment about her being pregnant. An army of reporters on her doormat demanding a comment? Psychofans sending her death threats and screaming to stay away from the hot guitarist? 

Probably. 

What she didn’t expect was Stargazers Squad accepting her caps-locked answer to the pregnancy comment, explaining it was JUST A JOKE.

That was the end of the story, all the fans simply liked her comment. Like it was not a big deal. 

She needed to block Eve on her every social media account though, because her best friend was creating super conspiracy theories about her and Mike and yes, Kara was probably going to die by her hand (Kara, occupied with more important things, absently noticed Eve stopped calling her every 5 minutes during the day and forgot to get suspicious about it).

Kara realized, thinking about Mike and his shenanigans, that it probably was a normal thing, and he was well known for doing shit like that.

And well, he was in a metal band, they probably just had some very dedicated fans and no one from the real entertainment industry cared, so she could breathe in peace.

Wrapped in her blanket she braced herself and went through the comments, this time more carefully.

Surprisingly, his fans seemed to love his performance. Shouldn’t have the fans of heavy stuff been offended by the leader of their favorite band playing cheesy music for kids? 

Kara told herself to not be a biased idiot again and kept scrolling the comments.

She learned from some salty fan, that dear William Dey had written an article not so long ago about… the downfall of modern music… and among some of the bands he was talking about, he listed Stargazers too. And said they were playing… music like Disney on steroids, but without any real feeling or depth. 

Well… that explained Mike’s weird comment about her working in CatCo…

She groaned and googled Mike Gand.

The first thing she noticed was that he was only half-American. His dad was a Swede and Mike was born in America, but after his parents divorced he came back to Sweden with his father, and then he spent most of his teen years flying back and forth between the two countries.

The funny thing for Kara was, he had been living in Norway for years now, and his band was registered there. Most of his bandmates were Norwegian too. That was the reason why she and Alex couldn’t find his band, they were looking for an American one after all.

Kara pinched the bridge of her nose. Oh, the irony. They really should have just asked Winn, huh? The problem would have been solved in a freaking minute, and it would have spared her a massive hangover. 

She put headphones on her head, opened YouTube and searched for Stargazers. And wow, they were much more popular than she expected.

Kara chose a video of a song named The Kinslayer but her fingers hesitated before pushing enter.

She bit the inside of her cheek. Was it a good idea? The music and video could be horrible, full of growls, gushing blood, horrible sounds, and she could hate it.

Even worse, she could love it, and then what? 

He lived on the other side of the planet, he didn’t try to contact her, maybe he was even a satanist who loved to murder cats on black masses, so what was the point?

She sighed and slowly removed her hand, ready to close YouTube, but sudden loud knocking to her door made her yelp and she accidentally clicked the video.

Kara spent the next few hours glued to her computer, watching clip after clip and ending on Spotify, going through their whole discography.

(She totally forgot about the knock on her door. It was probably just Eve, anyway).

Kara was absolutely floored. 

The music was breathtaking. It was a polyamorous marriage between metal, symphonies and sounds she would have never expected fitting this type of music. Pipes? Growls? Animal and weather sounds? Choirs? Every kind of vocal you could imagine? 

Everything merged all together creating something amazing that took her on a challenging, soul wrenching journey. 

Sometime, while listening to the 20-minutes long piece, she almost called William to have a talk about his misconceived opinions about music.

Instead, she took a deep breath and played a video from their gig from some big ass open air concert, where they rocked thousands of fans.

He didn’t sing a lot, after all their lead vocalist was a short red-haired girl who had more energy on the scene than a horde of kindergarten kids, but when he did… damn, she could listen to him for the whole night.

And she did, while falling asleep in the middle of Sleeping Sun, a song he sang at the airport.

*

She was woken up by the annoying sound of her cell phone.

“Yes?” she answered sleepily and yawned.

_ “Are you ready?” _

Kara froze when she recognized Eve’s cheerful voice.

Alarm bells started ringing in her head violently.

First of all, Eve was not yelling. And secondly, which was scarier, she sounded really, really happy… like a cat who just had eaten a canary.

“Ready?” Kara asked slowly.

_ “For the concert!” _

“Concert?”

_ “Yes, Kara the concert, the one Mon-El invited you to attend. Stop sounding like a parrot.” _

Kara’s world froze.

“Mon-El?” she repeated weakly.

_ “Oh my God, yes Mon-El, the cute guy who contacted me yesterday on Twitter and kindly asked for your address, and BEFORE you start screaming about giving your personal data to strangers I asked Alex to check him and yes, he was not some creep but your hot guitarist and-” _

Eve stopped talking and Kara heard her friend start to hyperventilate.

_ “DON’T TELL ME YOU DIDN’T OPEN THE DOOR WHEN HE CAME, OH MY GOD KARA I’M GOING TO KILL YOU IF YOU FUCKED IT UP- _ ”

Kara didn’t listen.

The knock on the door yesterday. That was… Mike?

_ “I WANT TO BE THE MAID AT YOUR WEDDING-” _

Kara looked at the door and gasped when she saw a piece of paper that someone slid under the door.

_ “-AND THE GODMOTHER OF YOUR CHILDREN!” _

She grabbed it and read a few handwritten sentences inviting her for the concert. 

It was signed as  _ The Grinch _ .

Kara stared at the clock.

The concert was starting in half of an hour. 

“Will call you later, I need to brush my teeth,” she said to Eve and ended the call.

She took a deep breath, screamed and ran to the bathroom.

*

Kara was super late, so she didn’t have time to feel surprised when the taxi driver stopped in front of the National City Veteran Center. She just ran into a building and then followed the sounds of the music.

She stopped at the door of a canteen that was arranged into a recital hall with a small scene where the band was performing in front of hundreds of veteran soldiers.

“They’re amazing, huh?”

Kara turned her head to a male nurse who stood near her when the band finished a song and the hall erupted with cheers.

“They are,” she said simply watching the crowd. Some were sitting on wheelchairs, some were sitting on the chairs and holding crutches, some had artificial limbs.

But all were happy, some even headbanged, looking absolutely thrilled and carefree.

“This is the first time when they’re playing here?” she asked the nurse.

“No, a few years ago one of our patients, who was their fan, sent them a letter asking if they could post some clips from their American tour, because he really wanted to see them live, but his medical health condition was severe. Instead of posting the clips, after they ended their tour they came and played a concert.” The nurse smiled. 

“Stargazers play concerts here every year. It became a tradition.”

Kara wanted to ask him more, but the band started to play another song and Mike caught her sight.

He smiled so broadly and cheerfully that she simply had to smile back. From this point, for the next hour she followed his every move with her eyes.

When they finally finished playing, and he hopped from the scene and approached her slowly with a shy smile, she wanted to tell him so many things that were circling in her head for the past few days, her whole speech she prepared in the taxi.

But well, instead she did something she had  _ dreamt  _ about.

Kara grabbed his shirt, kissed him hard, and almost melted when he kissed her back.

The pic of their passionate make out session somehow ended on Twitter. Boy,  _ it  _ went viral.

And yes, Winn forgave her right after she gave him their newest album signed by all members of the band.

*

Despite many obstacles, their relationship worked perfectly.

After all, you can be a reporter on every part of the planet, planes were flying, and you could call your annoying boyfriend, who could easily keep you on your toes, anytime you wanted, and it was everything you needed.

Ok,  _ almost  _ everything, and she wished they could meet more often, especially in the beginning of their relationship, but when they met extraordinary things happened - Eve was right as always, guitarists were amazing with their fingers.

As for Kara’s best friend - yes, she was the maid at their wedding and godmother of their first daughter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so I stole all the song names from my fave band Nightwish (The Kinslayer, Sleeping Sun). And well, Stargazers (also their song title) were inspired by Nightwish, becasue hell yes, they are fantastic and their music is the best thing that happened to me. But no, Freya and Fitz are my original characters, I left all real band members alone and away from it. 
> 
> Tbh, I was thinking about stuff lately, and this one might be my the last karamel fic. For sure I'm going to finish Night of The Hunter, but not sure if I'm going to start new stories. 
> 
> Anyway, hoped you liked it. Big thanks for all the readers.

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, sorry if you found your faves bands/artists are not liked by Mon-El, sorry, forgive him (and me!). He's a metalhead here, after all :)  
> But I seriously think that as long as you enjoy music, it is a good music (at least for you and that's the most important thting).  
> The title is also a title of Lordi's song (it's hilarious).  
> The shit Mon said about Kanye West is REAL, he seriously did it and no comments.  
> The song about a tractor is real too and... in a way it is amazing...  
> Hope you liked it!  
> Comments, thoughts and criticism are welcome!  
> Love you all, hope you are all safe and healthy!


End file.
